what if we were just nameless things with no memory, no idea of what we were, no idea of what was to come or what is or what shall be
“This is the part of the story,” Maud said as she selected a pastry from one of the many inexplicably laid out on Twilight’s table, “where you are thrust into a situation for which you are not prepared, thus setting a tone for the story and inviting others witnessing it to be invested in your relatability as a character.”
“What?” Twilight asked.
The scene before her was this: her kitchen, with its beautiful decor and spotless counters, played host to a menagerie of ponies who, by all rights, had no business being there. Luna, with bags under her eyes and a coffee mug in hand, leaned in the corner in her chair like some character out of an old Western. Maud, straight as a board, looking intently at the comically large tray of pastries, the names of which escaped Twilight and also the nebulous forces which dictated her actions. Trixie, huddled over a scroll. Cadance who stared with Maud’s intensity at all the others, and lastly but certainly not the least confusing, Chrysalis. Was she still a queen? How did that work? Twilight guessed technically Thorax had performed a coup? Were spontaneous revolts by the oppressed changeling proletariat a coup? What constituted a coup?
“What?” she asked again.
“This is the exposition,” Maud said. She selected a danish, which was good because Twilight remembered what those were called. It was cream cheese, which is the best kind of danish. “Essentially, this part of the tale that you are in at present, Your Highness, is the least interesting part. Not to say that it isn’t interesting, per se, but that it’s just the lead in. It sets the tone, invites--”
“I got that part,” Twilight said woodenly, which is actually kind of a ridiculous way to express a flat, expressionless sort of sounding voice. “That doesn’t explain why you’re in my kitchen.”
“Well, why are you in your kitchen?” Luna groused. She sipped her coffee, which was black as midnight, which is a hamfisted attempt to play on her nature as being connected somehow nebulously to the moon and its courses, which is a fancy way of saying she makes it do stuff. Maybe?
“I couldn’t sleep.” Twilight blinked. She had been doing a lot of blinking in the last seventy-four seconds.
“And?”
“And then I came down for a snack? Is that a crime.”
“Yes,” Maud said.
“It… what?” Twilight took a step back.
“It was a joke. The humor is based on an unexpected answer to a rhetorical question.”
“I…”
Maud continued on. “This, what we are doing, is what is called establishing a chronological sequence of events. We began in media res, which is a fancy way of saying ‘in the middle of things’. You have no idea why we are here, nor what will happen, and any observer would be thrust into this situation as it is already beginning, so as to heighten their interest. Ponies like to know the full story.”
“Please,” Twilight said, “please, for the love of the stars and Celestia, please tell me why you are all having some sort of weird tea party in my kitchen at… what time is it?”
Cadance, not looking away from Chrysalis, answered her. “It’s about 2 in the morning.”
“At two in the morning,” Twilight finished, using the proper way of inserting numbers into fictional text, as she was always very precise and as such would never dare be anything other than right about a thing ever. There was literally in this world nothing worse than being mildly incorrect about a completely meaningless and irrelevant point.
“Obviously, this isn’t a tea party,” Chrysalis hissed. “You idiot. Do you see any tea?”
“She’s got a point,” Cadance agreed. “No tea. Auntie Luna has coffee.”
“I ain’t your aunt, kid.”
“Aww, play along? I think it’s cute,” Cadance said.
“Trixie, the Decent and Pretty Okay, agrees,” agreed Trixie, who was decent and pretty okay. Trixie also did not look up from what she was doing. It was very mysterious, and there was actually no reason for her to even be doing that. Or perhaps there was, and not every detail needed to be fully explained, but it didn’t matter because Twilight decided to ignore her and her Very Mysterious Scroll.
“My sister is a perpetual virgin on account of being so tall that nothing can get it on with her,” Luna said gruffly between sips of coffee. She was really going through that stuff. “How could you be related to me? It’s dumb.”
Twilight’s right eye twitched.
“This is where things threaten to devolve into meaningless absurdity before being brought back into focus by a well timed interaction which suggests where the plot of the story might be going,” Maud intoned solemnly as she ate her danish. She was very neat about it, which in a distant sort of way Twilight appreciated.
“Okay. So you’re not having a tea party. We’ve established that Princess Luna is grumpy, and that Maud is…” Twilight shrugged. “Trixie, were you here for Starlight? Are you like having a sleepover?”
“Is that what you call a conjugal visit?” Luna asked and drank more coffee and generally looked sleep deprived and possibly hungover.
Twilight flushed. “N-no! What’s with you? What is with all of you? Why are you just sitting there when Chrysalis is right next to you in my kitchen? Where did these pastries come from? Why are you here? Can I have one?”
“What?” they all said in unison.
“A pastry,” Twilight said. “I’m hungry still.”
“Oh. Of course,” Chrysalis said, and magicked one over. “We’re not savages.”
Twilight flinched. “Should I be trusting an offering from you? You’re probably all changelings.”
“Possible,” Chrysalis said, dangling another danish in front of Twilight’s face. It was cream cheese, because Changelings like cheese and that’s scientific and Twilight could prove it, but wouldn’t because it would take too long and because her wifi was on the fritz. Again. “But honestly, do you really think that? Would that really be the best answer to this? Maybe a danish is just a danish.”
“Danishes… mmm.” Cadance groaned.
Twilight, trying not to think too much, and in fact failing at doing just that, accepted the danish. It was good. It was almost good enough to atone for the utter lack of meaning in this exchange she was having, but no danish is that good. Also, why was it called a danish?
“Have a seat, Sparkle,” Chrysalis said. “Unless you’re back to bed.”
Twilight had a seat. There happened to be one open.
“Is this a dream?”
Luna eyed her balefully. Twilight expected some sort of poetic, cryptic answer from her. She was ready for it, ready to dissect its twisting and slightly archaic structure and prod it for truer and deeper meanings. If she were honest, and Twilight did try to be honest, she always looked forward to when Luna did that sort of thing. It was just so exciting and romantic, and--
“No,” Luna said. “It isn’t a dream.”
“Oh.”
“We five are here,” Maud said, “as a kind of literary psychotic break. This is what is called a farce, wherein the actions, both external and internal, that drive the narrative are absurd in the extreme. The farce can be used to great effect in satire.”
“What she’s trying to say,” Chrysalis said, “is that you really shouldn’t think about it too much.”
“Think of it as a slumber party,” Cadance said. “Remember those?”
Twilight pursed her lips and looked down at her half-eaten danish. “I… I didn’t exactly have lots of those.”
“You had some with me!” Cadance sing-songed.
“Does that count?” Twilight asked.
“I would think it counts,” Chrysalis said, and then chittered. “I mean, if you want it to.”
Twilight glanced over at her, and then back to the others.
“Well… I guess… I, uh… Does anyone else want coffee?”
“The Slightly Cold and Supernally Disinterested Trixie would, in fact, like coffee,” Trixie who was actually very cold and only slightly disinterested, said. She sniffed. “Do you have cream and sugar?”
“Of course.” Twilight smiled and got up. She paused halfway to her coffee maker, as if wrestling with why she was making coffee for five uninvited guests with no set agenda at two in the morning, but with a flash she recalled Pinkie Pie’s haunting eldritch gaze and a rather murky and unsettling conversation which she only half-remembered. What she did remember boiled down to, “try not to overthink stuff, ‘kay?”
So she made coffee.
Maud spoke behind her. “This is the part where you think deeply about something which isn’t necessarily important in the grand scheme of things, but is actually subtly about something deeper. It’s a classic way of avoiding awkward exposition while also revealing something about a character and occasionally allowing one to be poetic in an otherwise dry narrative.”
Coffee was important. It was one of those important things. Twilight thought so, at any rate. Yeah, it was super important. Okay, that was awful. She had to start again.
Coffee was… Okay, so coffee was just coffee, really. She liked it a lot. She’d kinda-sorta lived on it in school, and the smell held a lot of nice memories for her. Coffee reminded her of a dozen dozen long and ultimately happy nights spent reading by candlelight in her private study room in the library. It reminded her of Spike, who had been so happy to learn how to brew it so he could feel helpful to her--that was the start of the whole “number one assistant” business, in fact. Coffee had always been a kind of talisman for her, same with donuts at Joe’s and her doll Smarty Pants. It had been a constant thing to return to, to remind her who she was and what she was doing.
There, much better.
She returned. Everyone but Luna had some. Luna’s mug seemed larger. Twilight tried very, very hard not to ask about it. Luna seemed to never run out. Her cup ranneth over. Not literally, because that would have been awfully inconvenient, but in a sort of vaguely metaphorical and altogether masturbatorily-referential way.
“How have you been?” Chrysalis asked as soon as she was comfortable.
This, of course, made her immediately no longer comfortable. Was that the point? Was this all an elaborate trap?
“No,” said Maud, answering the air.
Twilight looked at her coffee.
“I’ve been okay,” she said.
“Only okay?” Chrysalis prompted.
Twilight blinked at her owlishly.
A point of order. This was actually inaccurate, as Twilight actually in fact had an owl companion who did in fact blink, but his blinking was rather different from the blinking which she now performed in the presence of the rogue queen of the changeling’s greatest empire since Morrigan III’s deceptive sovereignty over the First Republic of the Earth Ponies and the Pegasi Hierarchy at the same time via an incredibly complicated and frankly kind of kinky amalgamation of disguises, enthralled lovers, less than-enthralled lovers, weak-willed sycophants, and ponies that just did not give a shit so long as the paperwork was done properly and their check was in their box on Friday.
“Yeah, only okay.” The junior princess shrugged. “I just haven’t been up lately, or if I have it’s only for a day at most.”
“Work stress?” Chrysalis said, cocking her head to the side with a little frown.
“I… I mean,” Twilight’s last resistance began to crumble. “Not entirely. It’s just, you know. Life. Life? Like, you know, being alive, having internal experiences. It’s rough sometimes.”
“Boo-hoo,” Luna said gruffly.
Cadance, who had been eyeing them all with frankly uncomfortable intensity, snapped her head towards Twilight. “Have you considered getting laid?”
“What?”
Twilight blinked.
“It really helps with stress,” Cadance said, breathing heavily.
“Are, ah. Are you alright?” Twilight asked. “I ask because you’re creeping me out. I mean, usually I wouldn’t just come out and say it but like you’re breathing kind of heavily and my ability to maintain my normal demeanor is basically at zero right now. Also, you’re married to my brother and for some reason you telling me to get laid weirds me out.”
“I’m having a… bad week,” Cadance said. She licked her lips. “Okay. Not bad. Weird? I think weird is a good word. Maybe?”
“Okay then.”
“This will not be explained,” Maud intoned.
“Look, I’m the demi-goddess Empress of love and crystals and shit,” Cadance said and produced a flask from hammer-space before pouring something in her coffee. It smelled strongly of paint thinner. “And like, yeah, it’s cool. But sometimes I get antsy, you know? Sometimes a mare just wants to find a secretive kink club buried deep beneath the earth where she can justify her perfectly healthy desires to beat the snot out of a consenting and adorable young mare with a variety of adult toys by saying she’s keeping the windigo menace at bay via the outpouring of sacramental Devotion or something convoluted like that.”
“That was oddly specific,” Twilight said.
“And a bit referential,” Trixie the correct and perfect agreed.
“Also, off-script,” Maud said. Her voice was beginning to change.
“Also not very funny,” Chrysalis said. “I mean, I sympathize. I really do, Pink, but…”
“Buttttt you could be anything you want. Busy later?” Cadance said.
“Is that paint thinner in there?” Twilight asked.
“Yes,” the rest of the table replied.
Twilight went back to her own coffee.
“I am… occupied, yes,” Chrysalis said, her eyes shifting from pony to pony. “Doing important things. Decidedly important things that are decidedly real.”
“Well, I also happen to be real,” Cadance said, sliding a hoof along the table. This hoof attempted to touch Chrysalis’ but missed. Then the changeling dodged. A third try. A fourth. They played at this for awhile until Cadance finally cornered her hoof and touched it.
“Chrysalis looked at Twilight. Unfortunately, Twilight was looking at her coffee,” Maud chanted. “The Song wove them together and yet they refused to yield to the world-love, verily they--”
Twilight coughed. She found another danish. Danishes are important.
“Have you, uh, I don’t know… talked to Shining about this?”
“Who?” Chrysalis and Cadance asked as one.
“My brother.”
“You have a brother?” Cadance asked, startled.
Twilight blinked.
She went back to her coffee.
Trixie, the Blogalicious and Just slightly not all-Wise, coughed into her hoof. “So, Sparkle. You mentioned you were having trouble with, uh, things?”
Twilight kept looking at her coffee. “I don’t know, I just… I haven’t been really--”
Cadance had lost the attentions of Chrysalis, and moved onto Trixie, who flushed and tried to insist that she was quite fine as she was, thanks. Twilight sighed.
Luna stared holes into her. Not literally, because that would be 1.) frightening, and 2.) unfortunate. No. She metaphorically, or figuratively Which is it? Maud, who was mid-apotheosis at that very table unnoticed by the mortals who shared a space truly hers, did not know. This last bit of knowledge was the final piece of a puzzle stretching back millennia. Ponies had toiled for so long and so hard to find the answer to the ultimate question. Questions. There were honestly a lot. One of them was whether it was better to say metaphorical or figurative. There were others but, like, Trixie nor anyone else really gave a shit about those.
But Luna continued to stare. Obnoxious authorial tangents, amorous alicorns, and apotheosis could not deter her gaze. Cadance tried to seduce her, and yet she did not move. She was constant as a thing that is constant. The northern star, as a point of order, is not only two stars at present but was not actually one constant point and the northern line drawn to declare it such actually has been closer to other stars in the past.
Luna continued on, rage like Achilles’ upon the Trojan plain. See her eyes like monsters that lurk in the cosmos--the blackholes that feast upon the troubled stars--see them not glow but absorb, see them as they suck the light and the life out of all things. See her sneer firm with the assembled and martial hatred of all things bright. See her coffee cup, comically large with the words I F%&$*$IN WOKE UP FOR THIS? emblazoned upon them in outrageous display.
“Well?” she said. “Are you going to say anything?”
No one answered her question.
She looked to Maud. Maud was busy becoming God the Lord of Hosts and the Paraclete Beneath All Battles, and did not notice her. Cadance was busy explaining to a bewildered but mildly interested Trixie Lulamalumoon, and that has always been her name, the finer points of shibari knot-tying and its long and actually kind of interesting history. Chrysalis was trying to sneak her chair around to Twilight’s part of the table.
And Twilight was looking at her coffee.
“Well?” Luna said again.
Twilight looked up slightly. “Hm?”
“I’m waiting.”
“For what? Sorry. I guess I just, uh, kinda went spacey there. Sorry. It happens.”
Luna paused.
She drank some of her coffee. It was not dignified, but rather sort of indolent and lazy in the manner of old cowboys who know their time in the age of the gun is short.
“I know a lot about space,” Luna began. “At first, I was baffled by this new expression, but as time went on, and it does go on, I found it more and more fitting. Space is vast. Infinite, perhaps--infinite, surely, as long as the mind flies and as far as it can reach, by that poor definition it is infinite--and even now some idiot somewhere who doesn’t understand that the universe is a joke is writing some essay to disprove this that no one but other idiots will read, smugly grinning into their watered down ale in neon-lit hayburger joints that serve their kind in the smaller hours of the holy night where only the desperate and the lonely end up--but in that infinity there is no focus. There is no up nor is there a down, not as we understand those things when walking on four legs on the good earth. Is this what you feel, Twilight Sparkle who says she is of Ponyville? Drifting, directionless, lost without cause or meaning in a malevolent and unkind existence, distant from love and warmth, cut off from the main of ponykind and the benevolence of presence, a runner from hope, alienated from the labor of your horn and hooves, exploited by machinations of unseen and unknowable fortune?”
Twilight said, summing up the entirety of her vast education: “Um.”
“You wanted my tongue to be sweet,” groused Luna, “but you did not account for its sharpness. Well? What say you? What brings you here? What cause pulls at the youngest princess in the Principality that she cannot sleep, that she drifts from place to place, that she imagines the company of strange and twisted shadows of her friends and foes and even ponies she barely knows? What agonies claw at your spirit that you would leave the comfort of bed for such as this?”
“I think I liked you better before,” Twilight said softly.
“Well, also you’re a bitch and dumb,” Luna said. Her coffee mug had grown until it was the size of a foal. “Better?”
“Yes, actually.”
“Oh, degradation play~” sing-songed Cadance as she laid flat on the table to push her muzzle into Twilight’s cheek. Chrysalis, who had snuck to the little alicorn’s side, squeaked and fell back. She planted a kiss on Twilight’s cheek. “You know, I’m totally into that.”
“Are you.” Twilight said hollowly, horrified.
“Oh, for you I am, my little Sparkles <3,” Cadance said, somehow actually pronouncing the heart emoticon.
If you’re curious, it sounds kind of like an aged Riki-Tiki-Tavi having one last go at the mother of all snakes but set to [INSERT LINK TO YES’ ROUNDABOUT HERE] this song and like, super trippy but also deeply moving, if you’re on a lot of drugs. Also it was less guttural than Twilight expected.
“I. What.” Twilight orated grandly. The orbs that were her eyes, because that is the best and only literary description for eyes as all literary sorts know and also honestly who would think to call them that and so it’s kind of striking yet also paradoxically played out, looked out upon this fresh hell of multicolored but admittedly nice-smelling mane.
“Mmmm? I can have us in a bit more private place as soon as you like, you little slu--”
“Is that paint thinner?” Twilight asked quickly.
“What?” Cadance said, her amorous stride broken.
“Paint thinner, like, in your coffee.” Twilight pointed. “The flask? Is paint thinner even alcoholic? You can use a lot of things as paint thinner and I don’t think any of them are alcoholic. I mean, yes, in some places the substance can be known as mineral spirits, but that’s not actually implying it is alcoholic. It just smells vaguely like vodka. It’s actually a product derived from petroleum and is called mineral turpentine in some areas. Yes, it is an irritant and ingestion in extreme amounts can result in a depression of cognitive functions, which in a roundabout sort of way is kind of like being really, really drunk? But its a very different experience.”
There was a long pause.
“Also, uh, it can kill you. Aspiration and then asphyxiation. Also, if long term exposure results in chronic toxic encephalopathy which is rather nasty.”
“Oh,” Cadance said.
“Yeah.”
“It’s Vodka, actually,” Cadance said, fishing in her mane which was also hammerspace and producing a bottle of paint thinner. “Shit,” she said again, in the same paragraph.
Cadance rolled off the table.
Twilight sighed. “I’m a domme anyhow. What were you saying, Luna?”
Luna sighed.
“I was monologuing, and then you felt sorta of bummed, so I went back to being a bitch.”
“Right.”
“But I was asking you what brought you down here.”
Twilight sighed. “I was hungry. I couldn’t sleep.”
“Just a bit of insomnia and late night hunger?” Luna asked.
“Yeah. That’s it.”
Luna looked at her.
Chrysalis laid a hoof on her shoulder.
“Is that it?” she asked.
“Yeah, that’s it. That’s it. That’s all there is.”
A pause. Cadance groaned.
“Is she alright?” Trixie asked no one in particular.
Maud groaned with glorious purpose, burdened by the impossible magnitude of her ascension. She began slowly to rise from her chair as she sang in a thousand voices of discordant harmony. “SHE WILL BE FINE ALL THINGS WILL BE FINE IN THE LIGHT OF ETERNITY SPEAK OF ME OFTEN TO MALELDIL SING TO ME THE SONGS OF VENUS AND THE CHANTS OF OSIRIS”
“She’ll be fine,” Luna said.
“I hope so,” Twilight said softly.
“‘M fine,” grumbled Cadance. “Can’t see.”
“That’s usually a sign that one is, in fact, not fine,” Trixie the benevolent and concerned pointed out.
“Immorrrttaaaalllll,” hissed Cadance and flailed her legs in the air bonelessly. Again, not actually bonelessly.
“Oh yeah,” Trixie said. She shrugged. “The slightly-less concerned and still benevolent Trixie accepts this.”
As Cadance began to gurgle and Luna poked her with a hoof and chuckled darkly, Chrysalis spoke again from Twilight’s side. “Are you sure there’s nothing at all?”
Twilight found that her coffee was infinitely important and worth staring down at.
“Twilight?”
“Twilight?”
“Twilight?”
“TWILIGHT?” roared the God-Maud, who had become an amorphous blinding light.
Cadance groaned something kind of like “Twilight?” but it came out kind of bubbly.
“What?!” Twilight yelled, and threw her mug down. It shattered.
“What’s wrong?” three voices, one supernal choir of ascended voices, and a drunken and poisoned Cadance warblingly asked.
“Nothing!” she screamed. “Nothing is wrong! I’m either hallucinating or stuck in a dream or this is real and Chrysalis is nice now and Princess Luna is mean and and and Cadance is a sex fiend and Trixie is there and Maud is…” she gestured with a hoof but no one looked. “She’s doing something and I don’t know and this is stupid and I just wanted a sandwich or something and why is life so hard? I can’t sleep properly, I can’t do work properly, and now I can’t even have a midnight snack and brooding session without the accepted realities of my world imploding in my kitchen and I know that they aren’t actually imploding this is more of like a temporary cessation but words are dumb and I am actually not as good as them as I would like to be or pretend to be and MAUD WILL YOU STOP BEING SO BRIGHT THANK YOU.”
Maud became roughly 8% less bright. It actually did make a difference, for which Twilight was suitably and proportionally grateful.
“I CANT EVEN CONTROL MY OWN DELUSIONS WHAT IS THIS THIS MUFFINFUCKING NONSENSE?” Twilight shouted.
Chrysalis offered her another Danish. Danishes are good.
Twilight stared at it.
“Why are there danishes here?” she asked tonelessly.
“Danishes are good,” Luna said flatly.
“Dnsshss ‘re so gddddd” Cadance Cadanced.
“They are pretty great,” Chrysalis agreed sheepishly.
“ON THE NINETEENTH DAY GOD SENT DOWN JEBEDIONI’THIZAR THE DANE THAT HE MIGHT BAKE THE FIRST PASTRY,” God-Maud explained out of the storm, which was thankfully small and very localized.
“Trixie the Mostly Correct and Much Loved thinks that they are only okay, herself,” Trixie the average but very hardworking mumbled. “She is willing to concede they are better than other things, as far as taste and consistency are concerned.”
Twilight took a deep breath, but found she couldn’t. It was like something was lodged in her throat.
Oh.
“I think I’m crying,” she said.
“I uh, I think you are,” Chrysalis agreed.
“That was a very reasonable opinion, Trixie,” Twilight choked out.
“Trixie thanks you.”
“I can’t sleep,” Twilight continued. “Okay? I can’t. I just wanted to work off some of my angst with some coffee and a damn sandwich or something. I’m sad sometimes, okay? Nothing makes sense and no one cares and the world sucks a lot and Applejack said something that made me feel ugly the other day and no pony with half a brain would ever have sex with me for like twenty-four reasons exactly and I know that because I made a list, and I can’t find my checklist for normal business things so I had to redo it and it was very long and also my first edition Daring Do and the Tricky Case of the Mysterious Yet Familiar Plot Hole, The Unofficial Totally Not Porn Parody went missing for like weeks and then I found it again but it smelled weird, and Spike is going to have to move out in a year or so ‘cause he’s going to start his growth spurts soon and I’m very not ready for it and--”
Twilight took a breath. This was actually pretty difficult. Crying makes lots of things difficult.
“And the tax code is really complicated and Rainbow Dash asked me to help her with her taxes but she keeps really shitty records and I’m afraid she’s going to be audited and go to pony jail and I’m still having that dream where Celestia asks me why we have doorknobs when we have hooves again AND I DONT KNOW WHY and I think Rarity and Fluttershy are secretly dating and I can’t prove it and I’m hurt that they kept it a secret and Mr. Cake and Mrs. Cake left Pinkie in charge of everything while they went to somewhere with hookers and booze for their anniversary and I had to help babysit and it was really stressful and reminded me that if I had foals of my own that I would probably love them but nopony is ever going to want to make babies with me so it’s not going to ever happen and Starlight didn’t know I have a weird and inexplicable fear of quesadillas and made some the other night and it was really awkward and also her budding romance with that stallion who suspiciously looks like Sunset Shimmer is so cringey and painful because like I’m mostly sure he’s gay and my wifi won’t work for more than an hour at a time and the repair pony kinda just shrugged at me about it and my student debt bill came in and I didn’t even know I had student debt but apparently I do and I keep seeing Pinkie’s eldritch face in my dreams as she pets my mane and tells me it’s okay to be alone sometimes and I forgot how to do something in calculus and wasted three hours relearning it the other day and missed an important meeting and Celestia hasn’t written me in weeks except for business and I miss her and I wonder if we can be actual friends now or if we ever were or I just imagined it and I’m scared all my friendships are actually illusions foisted upon me by circumstance and chance and that with time they’ll erode and also I have really, really, REALLY bad indigestion right now.”
Twilight, heaving, panting, stood now atop the table.
“Same,” groaned Cadance, part-way through death.
“HOW IS ANY OF THAT SAME WHAT THE HELL CADANCE I KNOW YOU LOVE QUESADILLAS AND ALSO YOU DONT HAVE INDIGESTION YOUR BODY IS FULL OF PETROLEUM PRODUCTS AND COFFEE HOW MUCH DID YOU EVEN DRINK ANYWAY?”
“Lots,” Cadance sighed. “So many.”
“ALSO FOR THE LOVE OF CELESTIA--”
Luna coughed.
“FOR THE LOVE OF CELESTIA AND HER SISTER LUNA WHO IS RIGHT HERE IN FRONT OF ME AND WHO I AM POINTING AT IN AN UNSUITABLY AGGRESSIVE MANNER WHICH I WILL PANIC ABOUT LATER WHEN I CAN PENCIL IT IN---FOR THE LOVE OF THAT WHY DID YOU EVER THINK I WAS GOING TO BANG MY BABYSITTER AS A GROWN MARE, KINKY OR NOT, NOT THAT YOU ARENT BEAUTIFUL AND NOT THAT I DEFINITELY HAVENT THOUGHT ABOUT SHARING YOU WITH LUNA AT LEAST ONCE WITH LIKE A METRIC FUCKTON OF PREDICAMENT BONDAGE LIKE AT LEAST A DOZEN TIMES.”
“Glad to hear it,” whispered the mostly immortal Cadance, and expired. And then revived.
“Feeling better?” Luna said.
“NO.” Twilight screamed.
“Mostly, yes!” Cadance said brightly.
“WHY IS LIFE HARD.”
“Twilight,” Chrysalis said calmly.
“WHAT.”
“Could you get off the table? It’s rude. Even I know that.”
“OH. SORRY. I MEAN LIKE LEGITIMATELY SORRY NOT LIKE IM SARCASTICALLY SORRY JUST HOLD ON give me a moment okay on the floor again.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Can I keep screaming?”
“Does it help?”
“A little.”
“I’m sorry, for what it’s worth. Which is, unfortunately, probably nothing. But someone should say it.”
Twilight sniffled. “Can I please go to bed now?”
“Of course.”
“Will you go back to being a jerk?”
“Probably.”
“Is this a dream? Am I hallucinating?”
Chrysalis shrugged.
Twilight stared at her.
And then Twilight hugged her fiercely.
And then she stumbled back to bed.
And Cadance had another Danish. It still tasted like paint thinner, though.
Author's Note
I wrote most of this in 46-50 degree weather on a wooden porch with no coat on at my favorite cafe and finished after midnight 2 hours after close which was good cause I needed to pee like reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeallly bad but luckily I still had plenty of cigarettes so I could focus on something else but WOW it is hard to drive that way and I think everyone should at some point try it, kind of like immersion therapy? But with like holding your bladder instead of like phobias. Maybe that makes you better at it? It might actually make you worse and then instill in you a lifelong fear of wetting yourself in your car. Or it could teach you a fundamentally important lesson about the nature of things in an unfeeling world I don't know man but hey I made it to work this morning and had two donuts and they were great and I hope you get to have donuts too.
